Alf welcomes the PM’s political offensive on behalf of the wealthy.
He has urged the rest of the country not to be jealous if the rich get more from Thursday’s Budget tax package because the rich are crucial to the economy.
It’s bloody good advice.
Mind you, Alf happens to think the poor are crucial to the economy too. We need them to work for the wealthy, preferably for low wages to enable the wealthy who hire them to get even wealthier.
Even better is to have plenty of the poor buggers on the dole, so those with jobs become less inclined to push for higher wages, because they can be easily replaced.
Trouble is, they are susceptible to the bleating of the Labour Party and the trade unions, and they will be apt to be persuaded they are deserving of something better when Goff and his mob start spouting about the injustice of the Key Government’s tax changes.
Goff’s spin doctors will be on the case already, you can be sure, preparing half-baked press statements on the strength of this report at Stuff today –
What is shaping as the biggest tax package in decades could be worth more than $3 billion.
But it is expected to deliver little more than $6 a week extra to low and middle-income earners as across-the-board personal tax cuts are clawed back by a rise to 15 per cent in GST and extra tax from property investors.
Those earning more than $500,000 a year would get a $481-a-week tax cut, and even taking into account their extra GST payments, they will be more than $300 a week better off.
By coming up with this re-arrangement of who pays what, we Tories are showing we know on what side our bread is buttered (and our plates piled high with oysters, caviar, and other necessities of the good life).
We are batting for the rich and it’s time we unabashedly said so.
The Boss did this very well yesterday.
Mr Key has promised that the “tax switch” will leave no-one worse off and the vast bulk of people better off.
But yesterday he began selling the need for bigger tax cuts for higher earners.
“We can be envious about these things but without those people in our economy all the rest of us will either have less people paying tax or fundamentally less services that they provide,” he said.
He added that those on the top rate, expected to be cut from 38 per cent to 33 per cent, consumed more and therefore paid more GST.
“But … those who pay the top personal rate fit into some core and critical categories for our economy. They include doctors, entrepreneurs often, scientists, engineers, lawyers, accountants, school principals, nurses,” he said.
The top rate kicks in on income above $70,000.
“On Thursday [you will see] a deliberate attempt to make sure those people stay and put their skills to work here in our economy,” Mr Key said.
Stuff points out that other changes will make the tax system fairer by closing property investment loopholes and clamping down on those sheltering income to qualify for Working for Families payments.
Keep an eye out for Alf, if you watch the Budget presentation on TV.
The cameras just might pan around the chamber, now and again, to show how we Nats are overjoyed and the Labour mob dismayed.
If you spot a remarkably good-looking bloke somewhere on the back benches on the National side of the House, a model of high intelligence and modesty – that’s Alf.
Alf Grumble 